Review Date: Oct 9, 2019
Experience Prior To The Program
I had very little finance background before doing the Romero Program. I wanted to join because as a freshman in college pursuing an Economics major, I wanted to explore real-world opportunities related to business and the economy. I wanted to gain hands-on experience with finance and understand more about what a career in finance would actually be like.
Training Experience
I found the one-on-one mentorship to be extremely valuable. Mr. Romero made an effort to help me understand financial terms and learn technical skills after each lesson, and also gave me valuable career and internship advice. It definitely helped me continue to orient myself and better understand what I was doing and what I wanted to do in the future.
Mr. Romero made an effort to help me understand financial terms and learn technical skills after each lesson, and also gave me valuable career and internship advice.
Internship Experience
The internship experience was very informative and hands-on. I definitely used the skills I learned in training–especially financial modeling, due diligence, and valuation–in my projects and to make my presentation. Beyond the technical skills, however, I found the internship to be very useful in general presentation and research skills and in reasoning, analysis, and judgment calls. Working with others remotely was also an interesting experience that was sometimes challenging.
Mentorship
As I said before the mentorship was extremely helpful. I can tell Mr. Romero is truly invested in his students/mentees and offers both constructive criticism and guidance for the future. I felt it was easy to report my findings and learning to him because he would offer me help and advice in a non-judgmental way.
Career Development
Even though I realized after the internship I do not want to pursue finance, Mr. Romero suggested some ways my experience could help me pursue my current career goal of law. I could potentially use my understanding of finance and technicals to pursue corporate or M&A law. In general, I think my financial literacy and ability to understand how to do company research, stock valuation, and projecting of company earnings will be very useful for whatever field or enterprise I join.
Final Remarks
I think the experience will be very useful for anyone deeply interested in finance or who is considering finance in any aspect. The program gives a very real look into what it is like to work in finance especially as an analyst, and will equip you with the tools necessary for a future career. My advice is to try to learn a little bit of the basics so you won’t be very lost in the beginning, but I’d say just be passionate, invested, and persistent!